New York Times bestselling author. Slow cooking expert.

Good morning! I swear I haven't fallen from the face of the planet. I'm here. I took a week off from all things crockpot. But now I'm back!

and better than ever!

or just back.

I had a really neat conversation last week with a mom at the softball field, and she was telling me about her husband's hunting trips and how he likes to make chile verde with wild boar. It sounded wonderful. Except for the wild boar part. She mentioned that he once put in some homemade sausage that had a lot of sage in it, and it really made the dish "pop"---so now they always toss in a lot of sage. After some googling, I learned that a lot of verde recipes use sage.

I don't really have a way to end this thought.

You can do what I did, and make the Chile Verde by scratch, or you can totally go the lazy way, and get a bottle of salsa verde from the store and pour it on top of a hunk of meat. That is perfectly okay.

I used a 6 quart. Trim any visible fat from the meat, and plop into your slow cooker stoneware. Add diced bell pepper and onion. If your tomatillos have the leafy-outer skin left on them, take the skin and stem off, and dice finely (I used the pampered chef chopper thingy. You can pulse in a food processor, instead, if you'd like). Pour in the contents of the diced chile can and the tomato can. Add spices. Stir a bit to get the spices down the sides of the meat. Add chopped cilantro to the top.Cover and cook on low for 8-10 hours, high for 6, or until meat shreds easily with a fork. After 7 hours on low, my meat was still pretty tough, so I chopped it into large chunks, and put it back in the pot for another 2 hours. By then, it had shredded nicely for me.

Serve with rice, corn tortillas, shredded cheese, and a dollop of sour cream.oh! and refried beans.

The Verdict.

Delicious. 3 out of the 4 of us ate this happily, and the other had a quesadilla. The meat was super tender, and had a good flavor. Ours was not spicy *at all.* If you'd like more heat, you can add more red pepper or top with some jalapeno slices at the table. Adam and I had the meat the next day for lunch, and it had even more flavor.If I was going to make this for company, I'd maybe cook it over night, shred the meat, then keep it on low during the day to soak up the sauce flavor throughout the day. If your slow cooker releases a lot of steam through a vent hole, put a layer of foil over the stoneware, then put the lid on. You want a lot of moisture to tenderize the meat. Be super careful when removing the foil----the steam will be quite hot.

43 comments:

I'm scared. Hold my hand, please. Can you tell me what it tastes like? What flavors to expect, what it most resembles? I'm always a 'fraidycat when it comes to something new like this, but I love all the ingredients so I want to be brave and try this.

Here's a little sage advice... nursing moms should avoid it, it can dry up your milk. On the other hand, if you are not nursing, and you have icky allergies, eat some sage in your food, dry ya right up either way.

Chili Verde tastes sort of "green" with a little tang compared to some Mexican foods. It has a rich flavor but not with real "deep, low notes" if you know what I mean. It really is hard to describe.

Honestly, if the ingredients are things you like, I can safely assure you that you will like this. I make chili verde several different ways (never with wild boar tho!) and have never had anyone who likes Mexican food dislike it.

My easy version uses a large can of green enchilada sauce, an onion, a bunch of cilantro, a small drain jar of nopalitos (cactus, yummy) and some extra seasonings if it strikes my fancy.

Mmmm, chile verde. Mmmmmm. Home-made tortillas are the best with this.

If you wash your tomatillos with a bit of dish soap it will take off the sticky residue that is on them (along with any dirt) and it will keep them from causing the scum that can form on top of recipes using tomatillos. (Just make sure you rinse well!)

I am currently in the hospital as a patient, reading this and through all your old posts. I know I will be on near bed rest when I get home so I am looking forward to making some of the recipies. I may be sick but a girl still has to eat. I love this blog and you are the best Steph!!

Yummo. We just bought a new crock pot...We have been married for 28 years, and didn't trust the 1st one. Seemed to get soooo hot when we used it. Didn't want to leave it alone during the day. So I'm anxious to try some more of your recipes. Hope you had a good weekend. Take care ~Natalie

Of all of your recipes, this is my favorite so far! I did not choose the "lazy way" and followed your recipe exactly except to increase red pepper flakes to 1 teaspoon. Still not too spicy for the masses at my house. I drained most of the juice with a slotted spoon for each burrito (I used flour tortillas) I made, rolled them up, topped with monterrey pepper jack cheee and more chili verde sauce (this time, the bottled or canned kind),zapped it for a minute in the microwave an VOILA! Very authentic tasting...must be the sage. I'm going to make enchiladas with this meat, too. YUMMY and thanks for sharing!

Hi Melanie,I don't think I've seen chile verde at the store. Chile Verde is this meal: meat with green sauce. Salsa Verde is the green salsa at the store with the regular salsas. To make Chile Verde the lazy way, take a jar of the salsa verde and pour it over a hunk of meat and slow cook all day.

This was SOOOOO good!! I used a pork roast and a can of Rotel tomatoes/chiles since I didn't have the canned tomatoes. I also used poultry seasoning instead of sage. I cooked it all night and then shredded the meat and let it sit in its juices all day. You were right, Steph, it's great that way! Thanks again!!!

This is the 1st recipe I have tried from your site and it was a success. I tried it exactly how it was written, even though I wanted to take the lazy way out. It was waaaaaaay too soupy to put as is on tortillas, but to be fair you said that. I used a colinder and strained it out before I put it on there. As is sat it did thicken up so next time its a day before- reheat meal. I almost didnt use the cilantro because I usually prefer it not to be in my food, but I did like it cooked. It wasnt spicy at all and my toddler son happily ate along with me.

First recipe I've tried from your site, loved it, but I can't make anything without messing with it.

I cut the meat into little chunks - didn't have to wait for it to shred that way - worked fine Used tomatoes that had habaneros in them, gave it a delayed kick for all the hot-food lovers out there Ladled out all that excess liquid and used it to make rice (instant, because I can't make decent rice), which I threw back in the pot.

This was excellent. Stew-like. Made it with pork shoulder and fresh sage leaves... which I'm not sure made it through the whole slow-cooking process... but it's all I had. Served over brown rice and ate allllll week as leftovers. Thank you so much for the recipe - will make again!

Oh wow is this good! I used a 3.5-lb pork shoulder and it cooked on low for probably ten hours. We shredded it and my husband put his over tortilla chips with shredded cheese on top. I put mine in a burrito with sour cream and shredded cheese. The flavor is awesome! It is a little "juicy" but that's what slotted spoons are for, right? This is a keeper and we'll be making it again and again...

This is a great recipe. I made it with pork shoulder and after 10 hours in the crockpot on low, it just fell right off the bone. The only thing that perplexed me was figuring out how to trim more fat off of the meat- I wanted to make it as lean as possible but am not sure how to get off more of the fat on that humongous dense slab of meat. Regardless, this truly was delicious. I also added chili powder, more red pepper flakes and jalapenos for more heat. Thank you!

Just made this today. Used a 6.5 pound (!) pork shoulder and in my 6 quart Hamilton Beach slow cooker on low the meat was falling apart after 7 hours. Next time I'll probably add more red pepper flakes and maybe even get in some jalapenos. We ate it on warm corn tortillas with our fingers. The suggestion above to use the liquid to make rice is a great idea, will do that next time. Thanks!

I had this last night. It was excellent. I only used 2.5 lbs of beef because I am cheap. It was very brothy so I tried to thicken it up with cornstarch so it was more like a stew for eating as leftovers. Love your Blog!

Thanks for the great recipe!I had a bumper crop of tomatillos this year, and didn't know what to do with them. Since my tomatillos are small, I cross-referenced with other recipes and used ~2lbs, instead of 10 whole ones. I made it on a Thursday to test out, and it was so good that yesterday I made 2 more batches to freeze :) Thanks again!

lovely recipe. I followed it exactly and served it in warmed corn tortillas with crumbled cotija cheese, a little cabbage slaw and sliced radishes. Cooked a big ol' 4 lbs up and 6 people devoured it - no leftovers!

I made this for a family party last week. Everyone raved about it! What a great recipe. We followed the directions exactly and it turned out perfectly. My aunt loved it so much that we drove to Barnes and Noble so she could buy a copy of your cookbook.

I used stew beef because that's what I had in the freezer but otherwise followed the recipe as is. Very tasty but not over the top spicy. We served this on whole wheat tortillas with cheddar cheese and sour cream.

@ Dispassia: To make perfect rice every time put 1 cup of rice (not instant) in a microwave safe bowl. Add 2 and 1/2 cups of water or broth. Cook on high for 15-20 minutes or until liquid is absorbed. Enjoy!!!

I did this last year, and canned a bunch of it (just had to thin it a bit with stock for safe heat convection, quarts 90 minutes at 13lbs pressure as I am at 4000 feet.). This year I am doing it again, just loaded up another two crock pots. I grew tomatillos last year, so am still using the ones I canned plain and as salsa verde for this early batch.

Yes, indeed, after 10 hours. Came out tender and delicious w/chuck roast. Toned down the foam of the tomatillos by grilling them first. The sheared chunks of meat shined so, I did not shred. We shredded as we used iceberg lettuce to make tacos. Before serving, drained liquid through a chive put the chunks of meat back in the strained clear liquid (I love to make clear stock all the time)